Running, Sewing and Plans

 The first part of this blog is a bit late.  Last Sunday I ran my second 10K as part of the festival of running.  The race went much better than the last one, although the time (56 min 52 sec) was still a bit slower than I would like.  I feel like I am making no progress with improving the time and am thinking of training for a half marathon distance.  With is in mind I have just returned from running club where I opted for hill repeats and I plan a 4 mile run with my friend tomorrow lunchtime and a 7 mile run on Sunday.

And I have been finding some time to sew.  I made a vest top last week and plan a cardi to match, ready for Mother's Day next week.  I also have this gorgeous fabric and I plan to make a blouse from it tomorrow evening.  There's loads of it so I might well make a dress later in the year as well.

On top of all this, I am planning to redecorate my bedroom.  My bedroom is south facing and very light and I have a vision of a very pale room with toile, gingham and ticking bedding, curtains, blind and other soft furnishings in blue.  I am busy finding the fabrics and working out what should go where for best effect.  Unfortunately the actual decorating can't take place until after Easter, but I need to have all the fabrics ready.

Glamorous ???

 I love these three quarter lenth peg or harem style trousers, they are so comfy to wear but I never seem to get the look quite right.

 These beige harem trousers were my first attempt at making them about this time last year.  They are much higher waisted than the pictures I have found this year.  I wore them a bit last year but couldn't really decide on a top.  Working on the black and beige theme shown in the first picture above, mine is in reverse, I teamed them with a black chiffon blouse that I made a couple of years ago and wear a lot.  It does look better on me than on 'Millie'.       

My second attempt used an original eighties trouser pattern and some black jersey fabric left over from a top I made this Christmas.  I had to make some alterations to the pattern as it wasn't made for jersey fabric and came out much too long.  Overall, I'm quite happy with this look (again it looks better on me than on 'Millie').  The shirt was made from chiffon a few years ago as a tunic, but it got caught on something and ripped at the bottom.  Worm with these trousers it can be tucked in and is them long enough to pull out to balloon over the waist.  The juries still out on weather this look will work well for me, it's very differnt to what I'm used too.
I wore these too work on Friday with a black velvet jacket that was a present many years age.  At lunchtime I went for a mooch round the shops as I had forgotten to take my crochet to work, and I was so pleased whena shop assistant in Next stopped me and told me how glamorous I looked.  Perhaps these are more of a success than I thought!!

I'm not sure this is fashion

 I'm not sure that culottes are ever considered high fashion, but there they were in denim and remarkably also in shades of brown.  I do rather like this denim outfit but my outfit is in chestnut brown corduroy and was made eight years ago for one of daughter's parties.

Unfortunately 'Millie' didn't photograph very well in this outfit but I think that you can see that the outfit is a pair of culottes with a sleevless boat neck top.  It is actually remarkably similar to the fashion magazine denim version the main difference is the 'fashion' version has sleeves.  The brown culottes I saw in the magazines didn't include tops and were only small pictures that I couldn't photo.

My culottes have large back pockets

More fashion flowers

Here are more flowers.

 

 This outfit teams a flowery skirt with a plain black top so it's not the most exciting.  The skirt was originally part of a sixties inspired shift dress which made years ago and shortened to a skirt a couple of years ago.  The black wrap top was bought in a charity shop many years ago.  It's very versatile and has been worn with many different outfits over the years

    As the flowery skirt outfit isn't very exciting, I'm showing a second outfit based around 3/4 length peg top trousers and a jacket.  It fits in this section as the trousers also have flowers on them. 

The trousers were made seven years ago from some embroidered denim material.  They have a inegrated belt front fastening which I made using a bickle from an old broken belt.  The jacket I bought a few years ago because I loved the colour.  Originally the trousers were full length and flared, but after a while I didn't really like the flares the material wasn't thick enough and they flapped around.  I put the trousers away until I decided what to do with them and so here they are reinvented as three quarter length trousers with cuffed bottoms.

 I even added button's to the cuffs as I had seen in some pictures - unfortunately only three on each side not loads.  I didn't have enough matching buttons in my stash for more than three each side.

Spring Flowers - the inspiration continues

I hope that nobody got the wrong impression about my following fashion.  I'm not a slave to it.  But I do like new things and if I can't have new then a change is as good.

This year I seem to be in luck, flowers are everywhere and I have loads of flowery things, as they are a favourite of mine.  Today's outfit features flowery maxidresses, another favourite of mine.






And here's my version, without and with a black jacket.

This almost floor length maxidress was made about five years ago.  I got the material very cheap on the internet and the pattern was free with a magazine I used to buy at the time, this version of the dress has a V-neck front and back with a zip up the back.  The ric-rac was given to me by my nan to help create the seventies look.  The black jacket was a present (also from my nan) so many years ago that I have fogotten.  I haven't worn the dress for a few years now, but in the past I have been stopped whilst in the supermarket and told how lovely it was.  I can see me wearing this a lot this spring.  With a long sleeved white top underneath and thick black tights and boots to start with, then moving to bare legs and sandals when the weather gets warmer.